Introduction
I was born in Bojnurd, Iran, in 1986. I studied fine art painting at The Art University of Tehran and received my BA in painting in 2010. In the years 2010 to 2016, I had a number of solo exhibitions, including one at Mehrva Art Gallery, and several joint exhibitions, at Barg Gallery and Iranian Artists House Gallery, to name a few.
In July 2016, I moved to Canada, where I continued my professional life as a painter and had one solo and one joint exhibition at Mekic Gallery in Montreal. At the same time, I rediscovered my passion for the world of independent graphic novels. My fascination and personal history with comic books were not always “simple”; I was born in a country where the publication of comic books was banned after the Islamic Revolution of 1979.
After moving to Canada, I started to work as an editorial cartoonist. My cartoons were published on a regular basis in four Iranian online magazines — Iranwire, Tavaana, Aasoo and Halazoon — which are based outside Iran and cover uncensored news about Iran. The majority of my cartoons were centered on women’s and minority rights in Iran. Fearing persecution and political retaliation, I was initially publishing under a pseudonym. After a while, however, I decided not to self-censor and to sign my works under my own name. This decision meant that I could no longer visit Iran.
In 2018, I began working on my first graphic novel “HANTÉE,” which was published in the summer of 2021 by Éditions Çà et Là in Paris, France.
I have been residing in Montreal since my arrival in Canada.